Costa Rican court strikes down tracking of daily's calls

The
constitutional chamber of the Costa Rican Supreme Court ruled on March 21, 2014, that
the government's secret monitoring of phone
records of the San José-based daily Diario Extra as part of a
leak investigation was unconstitutional, according to news reports.

Diario
Extrareported in January
that the Judicial Investigative Organism (OIJ), along with agents from the
narcotics and organized crime division, had been tracking outgoing and incoming
phone calls on the daily's central telephone line, as well as the private phone
numbers of some of its journalists. The report did not specify the number of
journalists whose calls had been tracked, although other publications identifiedDiario
Extra journalist Manuel Estrada as the principal target of the
surveillance.

The
daily also reported that the monitoring was designed to determine Diario
Extra's sources and had continued for more than 10 months, but did not
provide details as to when it began or if it was ongoing. The daily also alleged that OIJ
officials were secretly photographing Diario Extra reporters when
they met with officials.

Diario
Extra said
it learned about the surveillance from an extensive report leaked by an
anonymous source.

In
a statement released
on its Facebook page after the story broke, the OIJ said the monitoring was
part of an effort by officials to determine the identity of a government
official who had leaked information to Diario Extra reporters
about a 2013 abduction. The OIJ also said that the target of the monitoring was
the accused government official--not the journalists or the news outlet.

In
the March 2014 ruling, the judges said that the OIJ had violated the reporter's
privacy and his right to protect his sources, according to a review of the
decision by CPJ. The court ordered Estrada's records to be destroyed and forbade
officials from repeating such tactics.

The
daily wrote that the
decision was "historic" for its protection of sources and establishing that
journalists could not be the subject of surveillance for the mere act of
reporting and said it was an important legal precedent nationally and
internationally.

Days
after the court ruled, the Attorney General's office dropped its investigation
into the official who had allegedly leaked to Estrada due to a lack of
evidence, Diario Extrareported.